Come here... go away

We wrote occasionally a few months ago. She agreed to go dancing together but changed her mind.

I proposed a meeting simply to chat; she agreed, but never got back to me.
Then, four or five months later she wrote out of the blue to say that she was now ready for that proposed meeting, in the place agreed, and on the very next day without fail.

I looked forward to chatting. Something, I supposed, must have changed... I wondered what. She told me she was a good listener*, so I thought I might be able to share some of my struggles in the hope that they would be thereby alleviated, which is what friendship can sometimes do.

I put that word in italics to focus attention on what it might mean. I think it must surely imply some kind of relationship based on reciprocity, respect and interest. I mean a two-way process. One cannot establish a friendship with a statue, icon, alter, or mirror, as Narcissus discovered.

When we sat down for our cup of tea she told me that she had come because of her desire to visit the venue rather than to see me. I was an aspect of the experience, but not essential. She assured me that she would have been there without fail even if I had been unable to attend. 

She spent our time together telling me that she had no intention of getting involved with anyone and had no need for any kind of relationship apart from her family ones. Relationships, she said, always turned sour. 

By now I was wondering why she had contacted me and why she thought I might be interested in knowing her reasons for not wishing to get to know me or anyone else.

From a philosophical standpoint, to contact someone with whom one is not in contact with the sole intention of telling them one does not wish to have a relationship with them is a formative contradiction. Summoning someone in order to dismiss them. The notice that says "do not read this notice", and so forth.

From a humanistic standpoint, it was perhaps unfeeling? I had already understood that I was not within her desiderata several months ago and I was fine with it. 
Did I need reminding?
Anyway, inter-alia, I had never actually proposed any kind of relationship other than a dancing partnership (rejected), so she was preempting.

Since she had come all the way over to my house (ultimately) to tell me that she didn't care for my company, perhaps the subtext was that she might potentially care? Perhaps she wanted to elicit some kind of reaction. I could perhaps play the part, but I think an agreement would have to be forged before proceeding. One cannot simply presume to know what people want. It would be abusive.

- Narcissistic people do presume far more, and she was certainly drawn to that personality type, having sustained a long relationship with a narcissist.
I met someone recently who confessed to me that she always chose abusive partners. She was aware of it but continued to do it on the dating scene.
She was effectively choosing these dashing but toxic personalities for sensual reasons, dipping her toes in the water and then fleeing. I suppose that's an option, but the type of men she was getting involved with can be vindictive and obsessive so it is a dangerous game. -

Or was it no more than the fact that having accepted a proposal once (reluctantly?), she now sought to establish her righteousness by keeping the letter of her word, with no interest in her interlocutor, who had a mere walk-on role in the drama?
Who can say!

I sometimes analyse events and scenarios in this manner to help me understand why for example, I am left feeling empty rather than uplifted... or vice versa.


* We should surely be wary of characterising ourselves and rather let others do it. We of course have an opinion of our qualities and faults, but that is often quite distant from the way we are perceived by others (net of the sycophants, who will always validate our greatest conceits).